Let us pretend for the sake of this review that it’s 2007; people are getting shot at Virginia Tech, Bob Barker airs his last episode of The Price is Right, some intense earthquakes happen, and countries are revoting against their respective leaders. I’d list them here, but seriously, there were a lot of revolts that year. You could say it was…. insane? Hah, you totally though I was going to say ‘revolting’ but I didn’t and I totally got you. You should see the look on your face.
Anyways.
On top of all of this, Bioshock hits the market and ends up getting a whole slew of reviews and press. No solid reviews have come out beyond the wank-fests of the big game rags, and he Internet waits for the independent reviews to start coming in.
That’s where this review comes in. For those that don’t want to play along, yes this is a review for a game that I only just got around to playing about 3 years later. I was a busy man, probably.
To the review-mobile!
Overview
Bioshock is the story of one mans trip through another mans dream come nightmare. Not in a weird outer-limits sort of way, but in a legitimate ‘I built a city under the sea where the success of he individual is more important than the thriving of he many, but something went terribly wrong and now the city is falling down around my ears and I am half-blaming you’ sort of way.
Basically your plane crash-lands right at the entrance of Rapture, an under-water city built where the free man could truly be free. You walk into the spire, and are treated to an introduction by the man himself, Andrew Ryan. However, when you get to the city, you quickly realize that something is a bit… off. You are then sucked into a whirlwind adventure that is similar to a bad, bad trip though an abandoned theme park. That’s under water. Where everyone is addicted to self-alteration. And everything wants to wear your skin as a fine suit. You know, that tired, old story again.
As you work your way further into Rapture, more of the story unfolds with Ryan trying to kill you and Atlas, the perky Irishman talking you through the place to help keep you alive. Things, of course, are not what they seem to be and nothing can ever just be straight-forward. Especially in Rapture, the city of scaring the shit clean out of you.
A you get further and further into Rapture, you start to learn about how it used to be, and were it all started going wrong. The lines start to blur between the good and the bad, and you realize that even your own actions can have repercussions.
Gameplay
Bioshock plays more or less like your standard shooter. You have a melee weapon, your pistol, your shotgun, your machine gun, your explosives, and your sniper derivative. However it also comes with the added bonus of Plasmids, which are more or less ways of altering your genetics to allow you to do such things as shoot electricity from your hand. These Plasmid skills work along side your normal weapon arsenal to allow you quite a lot of freedom in how you deal with the local combative population: the Splicers.
The splicers come in a variety of flavors, from melee fighters, to explosive-toting assholes, to these jackass splicers that can disappear and reappear somewhere else just to fuck with you. They are all super-duper extra crazy, and when they’ not trying to rip your face off, you can listen to them saying any number of creepy, upsetting things.
Now, Plasmids don’t come cheap. Well okay yes, the Plasmids you find laying around are, but the good ones have to be purchased, and you cannot buy them with cash. In order to get your greasy palms on Plasmids that don’t suck, or to upgrade your health etc. you need to get yourself some ADAM. This is where things get worrying.
You see everyone wants ADAM, and theres really only so much to go around. The solution then is to recycle it from the dead because, hey, they don’t need it anymore now do they? So what’s the best tool for that job? Why genetically altered little girls with glowing yellow eyes, underwater sea slugs imbedded in them, whom have giant metallic body guards, and say creepy things like “look Mr. Bubbles, I can see the Angels.” Mr. Bubbles is the giant metal guard dog thing, just to keep you in the loop here.
You get the choice: do you harvest the little girl(s), getting way more ADAM but killing the girl; or do you rescue her, leaving you with less ADAM but lets you sleep at night. Are they monsters or victims? It’s your call.
So this is all pretty much par for the course in Bioshock. Pretty much everything in Rapture is meant to upset you, scare you, or put you on edge. Believe me when I say, Bioshock does a very good job of this. Hell, this is part of the reason it took me so long to even play Bioshock; I don’t do well with scare-tactic games. That is to say that I get wayyyyyy too into them, and this causes me to get really scared, really easily. Attach that to my itchy trigger finger and you get a guy that is running around scared and out of ammo for most of the game.
There are also the hacking and photography aspects to Bioshock that I should touch on. Hacking is pretty straight forward: you hack things to have them work in your favour. Hack a vending machine, and you get cheaper prices and a greater variety; hack a turret, and it’ll work for you instead of trying to shot the hell out of you; hack a safe, and you get its contents.
The hacking game is literally that old windows game Pipe Mania where you have to guide a glowing blue liquid from the start to the end without screwing up. This gets old pretty fast, and the only way to get around most of the hacking comes from photography.
Photography in Bioshock is something you really want to invest some time into. As you photograph Splicers, turrets, security cameras, and little sisters, you get perks. These range from increased damage against said genre of beast, instant hacking ability, or slight increases to your health and EVE (the juice your Plasmids use). Fully research something, and it usually ends with a Plasmid or Combat tonic (basically the same thing). Totally worth it. If nothing else, the ability to auto-hack turrets was a god-send.
I’m also going to say here that the levels are massive, sprawling, and filled to the gills with secret passages and hidden treats. Even when you finish a ‘level’ you will probably be tempted to explore every inch of the place before moving on. Actually, scratch that. You really should explore every inch of every level, because your whole Biohock experience will be that much better.
Also, it’s a total bitch to go back to a previous level.
Graphics
Rapture is pretty, in that exploded, ruined, and drug-adled sort of way.
I am playing this game 3 years later on an xbox 360 (with the framerate unlocked, which actually tones the graphics back a bit), and I can state with confidence that Bioshock is one of the best-looking games I have ever played for the 360. I’m sure there are others that can beat it, but remember that his game is 3 years old and still holds it’s own.
It really comes down to the little details in Bioshock that make it shine: the detail in the plaster walls, the screwed up make-up of some of the female splicers, the 1950s style art deco fixtures and posters, the list goes on. Simply put: Rapture is simply gorgeous to look at.
Music / Sound
Rapture may be wonderful to look at it, but its the ambient noises that will put you on edge right from the get go; creaks, pangs, haunted footsteps, distant screams, the list is endless. There isn’t a lot of music in Bioshock, but the music that does exist is well placed, and generally contrasts the situation so drastically that it only helps to increase the tension.
To cite an example: when you are walking around an abandoned apartment waiting for something to jump out at you, and “how much is that puppy in the window” is plinking away in the background, well… It screws with you.
Lets not forget all of the wonderfully terrifying things that everyone says. I am torn for my favorite; its either the woman singing “hush little baby, don’t say a word” to a pistol in a stroller, sobbing because the ‘baby’ wont cry; or its the lady lamenting how she came to Rapture to be a star, and then screaming “now look at me” is the angriest, most anguished voice possible. Seriously, the first half of this game works your brain like a fine dough, mixing in terror and fear this each knead of your mind.
Sometimes it’s the absence of sound that is more terrifying. There is point in the game that, if you decide to explore a little harder, you turn the normally loud, findable Spider Splicers (they climb walls and shit, yeah you read that correctly) into mute clay mannequin versions of themselves. They no longer talk, and no longer make a noise as they crawl up behind you. Trust me when I say that this is so much worse. It means that even in silence you are no longer safe, which was up until that point your one sole indicator of relative safety.
There is also a lot of background sound going on that I highly suggest you stop and listen to. The ‘Rapture Reminders’ change throughout the game, and give hints as to the situation and its deterioration. The info bytes featuring Mary and Jim start off as helpful tips, but slowly turn into a propaganda machine and they too help outline what is going on to Rapture and yourself.
There are also the audio diaries you pick up along the way. These help outline what is really going on, expand on the main characters, and even give you some random insights into the day to day life of the once brilliant Rapture. If you want to get the most out of your time in Bioshock, I suggest you find as many of these tapes as you can.
Issues
I’m really hard-pressed to find issue with Bioshock. The only glaring issues are the obvious ones: hacking is a pain in the ass, and taking photos of enemies basically gives them free-reign to rip you apart while you try and frame them just so.
Now as my own pet peeve, I’m just going to through it out here that any and all escort missions should stripped from games. The AI scripting for every escort mission in every game sucks just a little too much. Escort missions tend to become high-stress, annoying interludes to the fun parts of a game. Bioshock’s escort mission is no exception to the rule. It’s long, it’s tedious, and was easily my least favourite part of the game,
The only other thing I can really find issue with Bioshock is that going between levels is hard. Its in no way impossible, but its such a pain in the ass that even when you CAN go back to a previous area, you have no desire to.
Overall
Damned awesome. I wish someone had talked me into playing it when it first came out. I suggest that if you haven’t had a chance to play Bioshock, that you clear out a week in your schedule, kiss your loved ones goodbye, and secret yourself away in front of this game. Make sure only come out when your brain has melted and Rapture has been saved.
9/10
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